The Roswell City Council voted unanimously Oct. 14 to approve a resolution supporting the downtown Hill Street mixed‑use redevelopment and to authorize the related legal and design documents necessary to move the project to financing and construction.

Lede/nut graf: Deputy City Administrator Jeff Leatherman told council the project repurposes the former police‑headquarters site and adjacent property into a mixed‑use district with multifamily, commercial space, public green space and a parking deck. Council approved the design and sign packages, the master site plan, and the suite of legal documents that the city and the Downtown Development Authority (DDA) need to close the development financing and begin construction.

What council approved
- Resolution supporting the Hill Street mixed‑use development project and authorizing the city to execute closing documents tied to the public‑private transaction.
- Adoption of the project's architectural and landscape design package, building elevations and the master sign plan as the controlling design documents for review of construction submittals.
- Authorization of associated legal agreements, including the post‑closing agreement, reciprocal easement agreement, post‑closing occupancy agreement (to allow phased work while 911 operations remain in place temporarily), and the memorandum of understanding related to the bond/titling transaction.

Project highlights and financing
- Project program: mixed use with multifamily, retail/commercial, public green space, a promenade and 510 parking spaces (staff said 370 of those spaces would be in a parking deck the city will operate).
- Remnant land sale: 16 brownstone pads were awarded by RFP to Providence Homes at $250,000 per pad ($4,000,000 total) to contribute to the project's capital stack.
- Up‑front receipts described in staff materials included a $400,000 public purpose payment, $533,383 in impact fees, and $608,903 in permit fees (figures presented by staff in the transaction summary).
- Ground lease and recurring revenue: staff said a ground lease payment was structured to begin at $362,346 (reduced by the $4,000,000 remnant land contribution in early years); contract payments and phased contributions over 10 years were also modeled (staff cited contract payments starting at $273,734 with a total of roughly $1.7M over 10 years in the pro forma).
- Parking revenues and stabilization: staff modeled a multi‑year absorption/stabilization period and presented a conservative stabilized parking revenue forecast and a projected annual revenue profile; staff cited a conservative 2030 revenue estimate of roughly $1,670,000 annually tied to parking, lease and ground‑lease receipts.
- Financing approach: staff and consultant materials described a revenue bond issuance for the parking and related infrastructure (staff emphasized the bonding structure is revenue‑backed, not a general‑obligation tax increase; the city's involvement is structured through the DDA and a ground lease to create predictable revenue streams for bond servicing).

Schedule and next steps
Staff said closing milestones included an Oct. 28 bond market window for the title transaction, a December 2025 target for the developer's construction loan and a construction start in January 2026. Staff noted demolition will be staged so 9‑1‑1 operations remain active until the new emergency operations center opens. The developer forecasted a target opening/stabilization in 2027 and staff said project documents and the developer's financial commitments were in hand to permit market financing.

Public comment and council discussion
There were no public speakers on the item. Council members, the mayor and staff commended the DDA and the development team for the work to assemble the land, design package and financing structure. Multiple staff and consultants described the deal as a multi‑year, multi‑party negotiation that produced a denser, mixed‑use outcome than earlier entitlements for the site.

Quotes
"This has been really years in the making, as we have been working on this project," Deputy City Administrator Jeff Leatherman said.
"It has been a 6 month labor of love, many drafts, redrafts, many different turns of the documents," Assistant City Attorney Joe Cusack said of the legal work.

Vote and motion
Motion: Councilmember William Sells (note: transcript lists Sells as the mover for some items; the approving motion on the record was moved by Councilmember Allen Sells and seconded by Councilmember William Mortland). Recorded vote: unanimous; council stated the motion passed 6‑0.

Ending
Council authorized the city to execute the project documents and to proceed to closing and financing. Staff said they will post project documents, the pro forma and renderings and continue coordination with the DDA on parking operations and long‑term district management.